1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a laser treatment apparatus for performing treatment by irradiating a treatment part (an affected part) of a skin with a laser beam for treatment.
2. Description of Related Art
A laser treatment apparatus which is used in dermatology clinics or hospital""s dermatology departments, for example, a laser apparatus for depilation, performs laser irradiation while cooling an irradiation part (a skin) in order to prevent a burn on the skin which may be caused by generation of heat at the time of laser irradiation or to alleviate a pain which may be caused by the laser irradiation. As a cooling means to cool the skin, there has been known a means of cooling a window which transmits a laser beam for treatment and is brought into contact with the skin, thus cooling the skin.
As a difference in temperature between the window cooled and the outside air becomes larger, however, dew condensation likely occurs on a surface of the window. If the window in this state is further cooled, a problem that the condensed water (dew) freezes may arise. The condensation and freeze occurring on the window surface tends to reduce observability of the treatment part through the window, and to decrease transmittance of the treatment laser beam, causing a lowering of laser power. To the contrary, if the cooling temperature for the window is set higher for the purpose of preventing the occurrence of condensation and freeze, the skin could not be sufficiently cooled.
The present invention has been made in view of the above circumstances and has an object to overcome the above problems and to provide a laser treatment apparatus capable of performing laser irradiation while cooling an affected part and simultaneously preventing occurrence of dew condensation and freeze on a window surface.
Additional objects and advantages of the invention will be set forth in part in the description which follows and in part will be obvious from the description, or may be learned by practice of the invention. The objects and advantages of the invention may be realized and attained by means of the instrumentalities and combinations particularly pointed out in the appended claims.
To achieve the purpose of the invention, there is provided a laser treatment apparatus for performing treatment on a treatment part of a skin by irradiating the part with a laser beam for treatment, the apparatus including: a window having an optical property of transmitting the treatment beam, the window being brought into contact with the skin for laser irradiation; a window cooling unit; contact-state detecting means which detects a contact state of the window with the skin; and control means which changes a cooling control temperature of the cooling unit from a predetermined first temperature which is previously set higher than 0xc2x0 C. to a predetermined second temperature lower than the first temperature when the contact-state detecting means detects that the window is in contact with the skin.
According to another aspect of the present invention, there is provided a laser treatment apparatus for performing treatment on a treatment part of a skin by irradiating the part with a laser beam for treatment, the apparatus including: a window having an optical property of transmitting the treatment beam, the window being brought into contact with the skin for laser irradiation; a window cooling unit; first input means which inputs an operation signal representing that preparation for laser irradiation is completed; and control means which changes a cooling control temperature of the cooling unit from a predetermined first temperature which is previously set higher than 0xc2x0 C. to a predetermined second temperature lower than the first temperature when the operation signal is input by the first input means.
Furthermore, according to another aspect of the present invention, there is provided a laser treatment apparatus for performing treatment on a treatment part of a skin by irradiating the part with a laser beam for treatment, the apparatus including: a window having an optical property of transmitting the treatment beam, the window being brought into contact with the skin for laser irradiation; a window cooling unit; irradiation command signal input means which inputs a laser irradiation command signal; temperature change signal input means which inputs a temperature changing signal to change a cooling control temperature of the cooling unit from a predetermined first temperature higher than 0xc2x0 C. to a predetermined second temperature lower than the first temperature; and control means which changes the cooling control temperature from the first temperature to the second temperature in response to the temperature changing signal input by the temperature change signal input means and returns the cooling control temperature to the first temperature when no irradiation command signal is input by the irradiation command signal input means within a predetermined waiting time after the cooling control temperature is changed to the second temperature.